Chapter Nine
"What the-?"
Arthur was momentarily alarmed to find himself, upon awakening, lying face down on a stone floor. He shivered as the cold first hit him and it was an effort to coax life into his frozen limbs. He hauled himself to his feet and rubbed his goose-pimpled arms for a few seconds before groping for a fur-edged cloak folded across the back of one of the two chairs in his room. It was usually something he reserved for formal occasions. Nevertheless, he wrapped it tightly around himself now and walked about his room while his icy body slowly began to warm up.
It was a while before Arthur could think clearly enough to ponder why exactly he had fallen asleep not in his bed but on the floor. He considered the idea that he had been knocked unconscious before dismissing it as utterly implausible. Perhaps he had collapsed. It was not unknown for young men, even physically strong knights, to faint. This latter idea appeared more convincing but it didn't answer the question 'why had he been out of bed?'
Only then, did Arthur's sleep-muddled mind recollect his concern of the previous night. He had been pacing up and down, trying to find a solution to a problem. Yes! Then he had been praying for many hours, kneeling on his stone floor before God. He must have fallen asleep as he prayed. But why had he been praying, anyway?
Then it all came back to Arthur in a split-second: how Lancelot had refused to see him; how he risked losing his oldest friend, how he was jealous of Tristan. It was ridiculous, really. He called himself a Christian and yet he had forgotten everything he knew of his own religion.
Jealousy is a sin. Period.
"Tenth commandment," Arthur murmured. "Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's possessions".
But then that was equally ridiculous. Lancelot wasn't anybody's possession. He never had been and he never would be.
"I risk losing my mind," Arthur whispered.
It was not the cold but the piercing sunlight slashing his eyelids that first woke Lancelot. He moaned and shaded his eyes with his hand.
"You should not fear the light," said a quiet voice. The words startled Lancelot, who sat up and then smiled to see Tristan sitting cross-legged on the far end of his bed. For a moment, he fancied he could see flames leaping merrily in Tristan's dark eyes but then he realised that they were but reflections from the fierce little fire that Tristan had lit in the grate.
"Good morning," Lancelot said. His smile broadened as he realised, once again, that he was safe. "I must thank you for last night… and for the fire as well."
Tristan shrugged.
"Did you sleep at all?"
Tristan shook his head. "I'm not tired," he said. "I watched."
"What?"
"You."
A creeping blush spread across Lancelot's cheeks and he turned away.
Madness, he realised.
He turned back to Tristan who was watching him with a faintly amused expression.
"Well…" said Lancelot, suddenly at a loss for something to say. "Um. There's a chill in the air, don't you think?"
Tristan shrugged. "It's winter." He seemed to feel that these two words constituted an answer.
"Still, it's an uncommonly bad winter."
"They're all bad."
"Yes, but this one is-"
Tristan silenced Lancelot by moving closer and placing a finger to hislips. For a moment – for several long seconds, in fact – both men were frozen. They were seconds of stark clarity for Lancelot as he realised suddenly that the very air of the room crackled with desire. He stared at Tristan and wondered if the other man could feel it too. What did this mean? What could it mean for his relationship with the quiet enigma that was Tristan? And what in turn wouldit mean for his relationship with the other knights? With Arthur?
There were too many questions. Or perhaps there were too many feelings? Lancelot pulled away from Tristan's touch on his lips.
"Ahem." The clearing of a throat. Both men turned round to find Arthur standing in the doorway. He wore a crimson cloak with dark fur round the collar and a plain golden clasp. "Good morning." It was unclear from his expression whether or not he had been a witness to their 'moment'.
Tristan gave a cursory nod in acknowledgment of his Commander. Lancelot didn't say anything. He just glanced at Arthur and at Tristan and then at Arthur again and realised for the first time that was more than one meaning to the word'torn'.
Ripped apart.
Torn in two.
Torn between friend and saviour, between light and darkness, love and desire…
"Are you well, Lancelot?" Arthur asked.
"Mmm."
Arthur nodded. He opened his mouth to say something more and then shut it abruptly.
Finally, he mumbled a comment about sending someone to fix the door. Then he turned to Tristan. "A word, if you please." He left with the certainty of a man used to being followed.
Tristan made to leave but a strong hand grasped his arm.
"You'll come back to me before tonight?" Lancelot asked. He looked imploringly at Tristan and seeing the questions in the older knight's face, he sought to explain himself. "There are no nightmares when you're with me."
It was odd then that Tristan suddenly turned his back on Lancelot. "Of course I'll stay," he said, as if there had never been any question of it.
There was a definite note of thickness in Tristan's voice.
Once Tristan had gone, Lancelot crouched in front of the fire and basked in the warmth that enveloped him. After a while, however, the tranquillity he had found in Tristan's arms disappeared. Inadvertently, Lancelot found himself trembling and casting wary glances over his shoulder at increasingly frequent intervals.
You're going to spend your whole life looking back over your shoulder.
Coward.
A voice in his head was mocking him, taunting him. Lancelot backed away from the fire until he reached the safest corner of the room- the one furthest away from the door. Even in the daylight hours he felt himself gripped by an irrational fear.
Scared I'm coming for you, whore?
You should be.
Lancelot covered his ears with his hands and shook his head in a vain attempt to stop the voices. I'm crazy, he decided. Just look at me. Backed into a corner by whispers in my own mind…
Away from the fire, Lancelot's wounds began to ache with cold. Surprisingly, the most pain came not from that which he had come to think of as the 'unmentionable wound' but instead from his rib cage. The pain grew until it blocked out all other thoughts, all other fears…
Arthur led Tristan up onto the battlements. He leant on the wall and looked out across the country to the south, gentle and green in comparison to the wild north. "Do you still wish to leave us?" he asked.
Tristan said nothing. He knew he had come to a crossroads: he knew what he said now dictated the rest of his life. On the one hand lay war and freedom that would ultimately lead to death; on the other hand was life in chains: chains not forged of iron but of love.
But chains, all the same.
"Do you not have an answer for me?" demanded Arthur. He sounded at the end of his tether and his voice only reflected his appearance. His face looked old and craggy. A growth of stubbly beard, faintly streaked with grey, covered his firm chin.
"I do not."
Arthur sighed. "So you are not leaving at dawn?"
The answer given by Tristan was perfectly honest. "I do not know," he said.
"We will all have to leave here soon. More go every day: grooms, garrison soldiers...We don't even have a cook any more!"
Tristan smiled faintly. "We have Galahad…"
Arthur smiled too, although it did not spread to his eyes.
"You really do care for him?" Tristan said. It wasn't intended as a question: a blind man would have been able to sense the affection Arthur felt towards Lancelot.
"I care for all my knights,"Arthur said.
Tristan shook his head. "But Lancelot…"
"I can't stand it." Losing him…
"I know."
Tristan placed a hand on his commander's shoulder. "I don't want to hurt him. You have to understand, that's the last thing I want."
And with these words, Tristan returned to the man he was afraid to love. Several minutes later, Arthur descended from the battlements and headed to the stables where hefound his other three knights, huddled together and sharing conspiratorial whispers.
"What's going on?" Arthur asked.
Bors, Gawain and Galahad looked up at him with guilt – or else pity – written across their faces.
"Well, what is it?"
Gawain was the one who spoke. "Arthur," he said, "you've lead us through battle after battle. You've never let us down. We've fought together and we've watched our fellow knights be killed all around us. We've snatched victory from the jaws of defeat- life from the jaws of death. We've served you loyally for fifteen years."
"And I thank you, Knights," said Arthur, with a bow of his head.
The sound of singing reached them faintly. The voice was Vanora's and the song was the same one that she had sung the night before their last mission. It seemed such a long time ago.
"Land of bear and land of eagle
"Land that gave us birth and blessing"
"For this loyalty we ask only that you promise us one thing."
"Anything."
"Land that pulled us ever homewards
"We will go home across the mountains…"
Gawain glanced at Bors. "You must believe that we are telling the truth, even if you do not like what we tell."
"I promise," Arthur assured them.
"We will go home
"We will go home"
Gawain glanced at Galahad for a moment, as he gathered his courage. Then he looked at Arthur and took a deep breath. "It's Lancelot," he began. "The Saxons, they-"
The words were impossible to say. Gawain shook his head.
"The Saxons raped him," Bors said. "Evil bastards."
Arthur stared at him with eyes that were shadowed. "Raped him?" It was obvious from his tone that this was not something he had ever considered: that a distant physical possibility had suddenly become a reality. "Raped him?"
The three knights nodded.
"We will go home across the mountains
"We will go home, singing our song…"
The singing died out and Arthur, at last, felt he understood.
Tristan didn't say anything on finding Lancelot shivering in a corner and groaning softly in pain. He took a coarse blanket off the bed and pulling Lancelot to his feet, he wrapped it around the shaking knight in a tender gesture.
"Bastard son of a bitch," Lancelot growled under his breath. His words were clearly aimed at someone other than Tristan.
"Do you hurt?" Tristan asked.
"My ribs."
Tristan nodded. "I'll take a look. Remove your tunic."
For some reason this request startled Lancelot. He knew Tristan had seen him stark naked before- even since the rape. There was nothing to fear in Tristan's gaze and yet-
And yet what? Something was different now. Since this morning something –something indefinable – had changed between Tristan and himself.
Lancelot felt suddenly shy. Like a blushing virgin, he thought wryly. If only…
"I'm not going to bite!" Tristan said in a falsely cheerful voice. His voice changed, however, as he realised exactly what he had said. "Sorry. That was-"
"A perfectly reasonable remark," Lancelot interrupted. "I can't bear to hear any more apologies…" He plucked up the courage to remove his tunic and stood nervously for a moment as Tristan's eyes openly roamed across the bruises marking his torso, which was little more than a sea of black and purple. "A little ugly, eh?" Lancelot tried to laugh but the sound caught in his throat.
"Not at all." Tristan turned his gaze to Lancelot's face. "Lift your arms above your head," he instructed. Lancelot obeyed and Tristan slowly reached out both his hands. "If you don't mind?" He waited for the terse nod of approval before he placed a hand on either side of Lancelot's rib cage and carefully ran them up and down feeling for breaks.
Lancelot shuddered at the touch but said nothing. Tristan's hands weren't hot and grasping like Cynric's had been. They were cool and gentle and moved like ghosts across Lancelot's tortured flesh. What Lancelot realised, in his second moment of revelation of the day, was how intimate this action was.
"Not broken," Tristan saidafter several minutes of silence. He moved his hands away. "It's bound to hurt, though. Whoever did this…" He gestured at the bruises. "…Had a fist of iron. I'd imagine he cracked a couple of your-"
"It was Cerdic," said Lancelot suddenly. "Their King… the leader… He's huge. Giant blood, or something…"
Tristan didn't say anything, although he did give a slow nod of encouragement.
And in that moment Lancelot knew that he had to get everything off his chest. He grasped Tristan's hands and dragged him towards the fire. He felt suddenly cold at the prospect of recounting all that had happened.
"They kept me in the baggage tent," he began. "I heard the boards creaking before I saw anything…"
The physical pain in his ribs vanished: lost in the emotional pain of his story.
"…Then you arrived and I thought you were some sort of Angel." Lancelot gave a sad smile as he reached the end of his narrative. "I think I understand now why Arthur - why Christians – confess their sins. It's a relief: a weight off my heart."
Tristan looked troubled. "None of this is a sin of yours," he said, shaking his head. "Cerdic's maybe: definitely Cynric's and the other Saxon bastards too." Anger was creeping into Tristan's voice. "None of this is your fault."
"But it is," Lancelot said. "I brought this upon myself." Tears appeared as if from nowhere and streamed down his cheeks. "It's my fault entirely."
"How?"
"It's punishment," Lancelot whispered, leaning forwards. He was addicted to confessing now; ready to tell the one secret he'd never ever voiced before.
"Whatever for?"
Lancelot glanced over his shoulder. He motioned Tristan towards him, as though the walls themselves had ears with which to hear his confession. "All the women in the world could never satisfy me…"
He expected Tristan to run. He expected Tristan to be angry, horrified, disgusted… He expected Tristan to tell him not to be stupid; to tell him that it was unnatural not to fancy women. He expected Tristan to reassure him that he didn't mind, that it was all okay.
He expected a lot of things.
What he did not expect was for Tristan to lean forward with an almost predatory movement and press his lips to Lancelot's in a hard kiss.
Tbc…